


A Murder of Nightengales

by she_who_recs



Category: TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works & Related Fandoms, The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: (I started writing this in August), (the seasonal timing is coincidence), AU, F/M, Gen, Horror, Nan Elmoth: dubcon capital of Beleriand, Other, canon Melian is plenty creepy already, eldritch abomination Melian, evil Melian, genius loci Melian, it's like a bunch of horror tropes walked into an epic romance, this was almost too easy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-24
Updated: 2019-10-24
Packaged: 2021-01-02 12:10:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21161453
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/she_who_recs/pseuds/she_who_recs
Summary: What if a different maia had fallen?





	A Murder of Nightengales

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Drag0nst0rm](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Drag0nst0rm/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Other Shadows](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20444675) by [Drag0nst0rm](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Drag0nst0rm/pseuds/Drag0nst0rm). 

> Thank yous to [AmethystTribble](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AmethystTribble/pseuds/AmethystTribble), who changed seats and beta'd for _me_ this time, and to the SWG Discord group, for answering my many questions.

A nightingale trills, high and far away.  


It is the only sound Elwë can hear. He is sure he would have remembered such a strange place, a wood utterly devoid of life’s noises, but he has been following his own trail for hours, and here his footprints have led him.  


He spent an hour at most walking into the forest. He is certain. Nearly certain. Examining the ground for traces of his passage takes time, of course, but he has an uneasy feeling that it shouldn’t have taken that much longer. And now this silent copse. A wariness grips him that he has not felt since the shadow days.  


But the Dark Hunter is no more, he tells himself. The need for fear over. Shining Arômêz himself is here to take them to the land of the gods, and children can run wild in the hills again. No evil would dare touch them in the presence of the Bright Hunter. _No evil. Would dare._ His body does not believe him; without conscious thought he finds himself walking softer, slower. Old habits from another lifetime.  


The canopy thickens as he goes, until the sky is all but blotted out. There is only just enough starlight to create shadow, and no more. The darkness feels thick enough to choke on. It reminds him, in a perverse way, of the Godtrees, of how that haunting Light seemed to curl around your limbs and sink into your bones. This dead wood seems a web of unholy trees, breathing out a miasmic Unlight on anything unfortunate enough to wander under them… he curses his imagination, but can’t get the image out of his mind.  


The nightingale sings again. He is headed in its direction, he realizes. He suddenly wants very badly to go to the left or right, anywhere but the cage of crooked boles in front of him. He looks around, but the thicket is impassible; trees lean against their neighbors, branches twined through branches, like sweethearts at the campfire. With a sick sense of inevitability, he turns around. The path he has been so laboriously eking out is now blocked with thornbushes and woody vines. Dead branches splay precariously through the mess, waiting– he is sure with every fiber of his being– to fall on whoever might pass through.  


Dread hanging heavy in his stomach, he pushes his way forward. But even here the trees are narrowing, leaning in. As if they’re bending over to watch. The thought is irrational, but so is everything else here. The trees are watching him, leering, and it’s getting tighter and tighter and he has to contort himself into knots to squeeze through, and soon the gaps will be gone and–  


And the forest opens up and there is a gap, a clearing, a meadow silvered with blessed starlight. Rough bark skins his forearms as he pushes through, lands on the grass, gasping.  


As if in affront the ground trembles, bulges; the earth heaves itself up, a tangle of roots and vines and pale star-shaped flowers. The roiling mass is limned in a Light that is more than light, a mockery of his beloved Trees. Clots of dirt drop off as it flows towards him. There is no shape of any creature Elwë can name, but there is the sense of a female form in there, as though glimpsed from the corner of the eye.  


“Fleshling,” the not-woman croons, the sound slick and clammy as dripping mud. “Sweet, succulent fleshling. Your eyes burn with Their light. A rare sight for those of us in the darkness. So miserly, my brethren of old, hoarding the light for Themselves. Doling it out to Their fawning lackeys, while the dwellers of shadow go forgotten. Oh, but look, They’ve sent me a small morsel! A scrap, a crumb, a taste of Their most holy radiance, come walking into my very den. Oh, how precious. How delicious. Shall I set them in finest mithril? Shall I bind them on my brow? Though perhaps my lord will demand His tribute? But you have two, I can give Him one eye, mmm, and keep the other...”  


Fine maggot-white roots crawl up Elwë’s torso and shoulders, caressing his face as they grow over his mouth and cheeks. The smallest, most delicate rootlets touch the corners of his eyes, exploratory, and then wend their way under his eyelids. He tries to scream, but his mouth won’t open–  


–and the questing roots stop. He feels himself jerkily hauled upwards.  


“Where? Where is it?” Its singsong drops to a furious whisper. “Where… no. No. No. It’s a trick. It’s not in your eyes at all, is it? It’s in your fëa. In all of you.”  


His eyes are mostly covered in roots; he can only make out shadowy blurs. Nonetheless, he has the impression of an enormous head cocking itself to one side. The vines pull him higher, turn him over and then upside-down. Tendrils run down the length of his body, then retract. He dangles, helpless as a beetle between the paws of a kitten.  


“No…” The horrid voice sounds almost thoughtful. “No, I can’t take from you.”  


The twisted light is growing stronger. Sharper. Colder.  


“Then again…”  


Bright bright brighter and it won’t _stop_; the light is spikes in his eyes, it’s stones in his skull, bile in his throat–  


“…I don’t really need to, do I?”  


The light flickers and dies, and Elwë is snuffed out with it.

  


There is a glade. It is a pretty glade, with soft-looking grass and tiny white flowers. There are trees all around. The king likes to watch the leaves dance in the wind. Sometimes they dance when there is no wind.  


There is a queen. She is a beautiful queen, with long limbs and bright eyes. Very bright eyes. Sometimes the king thinks they remind him of something, but he always forgets. The queen has long pale hair. When she whispers in his ear, her hair falls over his shoulder and spills across his lap. If he reaches out with his free hand, the strands curl themselves around his fingers.  


There is a throne. It is a splendid throne, a lattice of living wood. It has small leafy whorls near his arms, and larger whorls over his knees. It is sometimes uncomfortable, especially where the branches come through the skin, but he looks magnificent upon it. The queen tells him so. _A great king needs a great throne_, she likes to say, and he is nothing if not a great king.  


There is a nightingale, above him, singing.

**Author's Note:**

> > "Then an enchantment fell on him, and he stood still; and afar off beyond the voices of the _lomelindi_ he heard the voice of Melian, and it filled all his heart with wonder and desire. He forgot then utterly all his people and all the purposes of his mind, and following the birds under the shadow of the trees he passed deep into Nan Elmoth and was lost."
> 
>   
From the Man Himself. Just putting that out there.


End file.
